


Any Agreeable Opportunity

by Laylah



Category: Final Fantasy XII
Genre: Backstory, Flirting, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-10-16
Updated: 2008-10-16
Packaged: 2017-10-12 17:41:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/127361
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Laylah/pseuds/Laylah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He looks the boy up and down. He should know the quirk of that eyebrow, that wry curl of lip.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Any Agreeable Opportunity

It's the accent that gets Reddas's attention first -- it took a few months before the locals stopped picking fights with _him_ for sounding like Archadian gentry, and even now that they're used to him they still call him "your lordship" with more than a little mockery. So when he hears a light tenor with an accent even more refined than his own addressing the tavernkeeper a few paces down the bar, he puts down his mug of ale and looks around for trouble.

Trouble's heading toward the Archadian at the bar -- dear gods, he's wearing lace, as if that's not invitation enough for every ruffian in Balfonheim -- in the form of a pair of dockside toughs, weathered and ugly enough they could nearly pass for bangaa. "Seeing the sights, are we?" one of them asks, grinning to show off the tooth he's missing in front. "Perhaps you'll be wanting to hire a guide, to keep you out of trouble."

The young man turns around and looks the toughs up and down like he's just been propositioned by a seeq whore. "And you think you're suitable? I'll pass."

Reddas shakes his head; the other tough takes a step forward. "Course, if you're too good for the company round here, maybe we should see you out." He reaches out and gets a fistful of the Archadian's shirt.

"We'll have none of that," Reddas says, pitching his voice for a battlefield, as he gets up from his barstool. "You're naught but trouble, Tobias. The boy only had the sense to see it."

The toughs both turn back to glare at Reddas. "There you go again," Tobias says, "trying to make your word law. Balfonheim's a free city. You got no more say than I do."

Reddas smiles, reaching up toward his shoulders. "I've two blades here to plead my case, if you'd care to make it a debate."

There's a little muttering in the rest of the room, and a few tables scraping backward, away from the bar. A good number of the men in this town have seen Reddas fight by now. Tobias spits on the floor. "You're not worth the trouble," he says.

It costs nothing to give him the last word, as long as he leaves, so Reddas doesn't pursue the argument further. The base criticism even rings true; however far he's ranged from Archades, the habits he acquired there seem to have dogged his steps.

When he turns back, the young Archadian is watching him. There's something familiar about the boy's face, something Reddas is sure he could place if he had the proper context for it. "Thank you," he says, which is refreshing, far more charming than the typical protest that aid was, in fact, unnecessary.

Reddas nods his acknowledgement. "It seemed the honorable thing to do."

The boy laughs, a touch nervously. "I wouldn't have thought to find much honor in such a den of thieves," he says. He sounds like gentry, but his clothes are rather...deliberately improper, Reddas decides. Still fancy, but fancy that's trying to be something else -- like a Trant theater's idea of how a sky pirate should look.

"I've found," Reddas says, helping himself to the seat next to the boy, "that the honor among thieves can be the truest sort of honor." He looks the boy up and down. He should _know_ the quirk of that eyebrow, that wry curl of lip. "You, for instance, look like the sort of scoundrel who's about to show how honorable he is by buying me a drink."

"You can tell that at a glance?" the boy asks, and smiles. "You are perceptive indeed. A young pirate could learn a lot from you, I wager."

Reddas smiles broadly. "I suspect he could at that." He gestures to the man behind the bar. "A bottle of Sochen brandy, if you please, and two glasses."

"May I have the name of my companion?" the boy asks, instead of remarking on the extravagance of Reddas's taste -- either he doesn't know how fine the liquor is, or he's accustomed to luxury himself.

"Reddas." He offers a hand for the boy to shake. "Lately called the Pirate King by some of Balfonheim's more interesting satirists." The boy's hand is less soft than it would be were he solely a young gentleman on a lark; there are calluses above the palm, and his grip is firm. "And you?"

"Balthier," the boy says, after a beat too much hesitation -- but at least that means he has the sense to worry about what name he gives. It jars loose no memories, and Reddas suspects that it is as false as his own.

As they drink, Reddas learns a fair number of things about Balthier: that he is well-traveled, despite his youth; that he has an airship docked at the aerodrome of which he is quite proud, and on the subject of whose provenance he is distinctly evasive; that he has come to Balfonheim in search of a viera hunter with whom he split a bounty some months ago -- he is also evasive about that, though less about the adventure itself than about why it has taken him so long to look for her again; and that he is a shameless, outrageous, and quite possibly unintentional flirt. In return Reddas volunteers the information that he sailed on ocean-going ships for a few years when he was around Balthier's age; that he lived in Molberry when he was in Archades -- a plausible lie that he's unreasonably fond of; and that the most entertaining evening he ever spent in the capital city was watching a performance of an utterly scandalous farce called _The Judge's Finest Hour_.

Balthier's face lights up at that -- there's been a revival lately, it seems, to great success and just as much gossip as the first run -- and it strikes Reddas abruptly, watching the boy gesture in support of one point or another, why he looks so familiar. Given another two stone and thirty years, he'd be the spitting image of Cidolfus Bunansa.

For the barest fraction of a second, Reddas feels cold, feels sure that the doctor's son -- on his way to the Magistry himself, if the rumors were to be believed -- has been sent after him, to track him down. But the idea is, _must_ be, ridiculous; surely if Balthier -- what was his proper name again? -- were here as an Imperial Judge, even undercover, he'd be more canny about it than this. More canny and more sober; his cheeks are flushed and his eyes too bright from the brandy, and his speech has the careful enunciation and deliberately florid vocabulary that Reddas always found so endearing when drinking with Zargabaath.

In short, he's quite charming, and as Reddas pours the very last of the brandy into their glasses he says as much.

"You think so?" Balthier says, blinking. "Thank you." He's been doing his best to match Reddas drink for drink, and he has far less body mass to absorb it; considering the handicap, he's doing remarkably well. "Are you propositioning me?"

He asks the question like he finds the possibility fascinating, and who's Reddas to argue with that? "I wasn't," Reddas says, "but I could. I imagine that if I did, I would mention that I have a rather nice house only a short distance from here, and that you'd find a good deal more luxury in my bed than in any dockside inn."

"Luxury," Balthier repeats, watching Reddas's mouth and not his eyes. "It has seemed a bit like there isn't much of that, after all, in sky piracy."

"Too often the case," Reddas agrees. "The wise sky pirate takes any agreeable opportunity to indulge."

"You _are_ going to give me lessons!" Balthier says triumphantly, and then ducks, as though realizing how loudly he speaks.

Reddas laughs. "Finish your brandy," he says, "and come home with me."


End file.
